Management briefs

Oct 04, 2007

Security classification chief at NARA leaves

J. William Leonard has resigned from his position as director of the National Archives and Records Administrations Information Security Oversight Office. Since acquiring that role in 2002, Leonard was responsible for overseeing the policies of the governmentwide security classification system and the National Industrial Security Program for the Bush administration.

Before joining NARA, Leonard held a series of information security positions at the Defense Department in a federal civil service career that spanned more than 30 years.

Bill Leonard personifies the true meaning of a public servant, Allen Weinstein, U.S. archivist, said in a statement. He has provided a moral compass for the Information Security Oversight Office and for the National Archives as a whole.

In his resignation letter, Leonard said he was especially proud of overseeing the beginnings of an automatic declassification process for nonsensitive national security information in the executive branch.

Exit IPv6 leader McManus

John McManus, deputy chief information officer and chief technology officer at the Commerce Department, has left government for the private sector. McManus was in those positions for less than a year.

McManus said he will be joining a small property management company in Kirkland, Wash., as its CIO. Its just an opportunity for me to go back out and sharpen up my technical skills for a few years, McManus said in a phone interview, adding that he looked forward to doing hands-on technical architecture work.

A well-regarded fixture in the government information technology community and winner of two Federal Computer Week Federal 100 awards, McManus was co-chairman of the CIO Councils IPv6 Working Group. Before his work at Commerce, he was deputy CIO and CTO at NASA and led efforts there to develop an agencywide IT architecture.Weve lost a great guy, said Peter Tseronis, director of network services at the Education Department. Im bummed.

McManus said he is only leaving government temporarily. Ive started my career in the federal government, and my plan is to  in the future  finish it here.

The GAO director of information technology issues is leaving government after 16 years. On his way out the door, Dave Powner details how far govtech has come in the past two decades and flags the most critical issues he sees facing federal IT leaders.